Watch: Five Weeks Of Camels, Kingdoms, And Moroccan Blackmail

Anthony Bourdain once described Morocco as a place to visit if “you were a bad boy of your time, if you liked drugs, the kind of sex that was frowned upon at home, and an affordable lifestyle set against an exotic background.” 

Things may have tightened up since Bourdain’s literary heroes wrote tales of lawless debauchery, but if you’ve been on the planet for a couple of decades and developed a hankering to get as far away as possible from the place you were born, then North Africa seems a reasonable place to start. 

Last year, Tom Butland and filmmaker George Syme, two young lads from New Zealand, decided to pool their cash, drop out of uni, and hop a flight to the land of camels, serpentine medieval quarters, and blistering right-hand points.

“I was doing my sparky apprenticeship and George was having a crack at uni,” says Tommy. “But he decided to drop out, so we booked a flight to Morocco. It was a pretty spontaneous decision, but one of our mates was already over there, so we thought it’d be a good spot.”

The fellas rented a car and spent the next five weeks flaming up and down the North African dust bowl. The result is the full-length surf film Desert Dogs, which features their exploits at various points, rock shelves, and beachies, as well as some nostalgia-inducing escapades in far-off lands.  

Saving their clips for the film, however, proved to be difficult. 

“There was this random dude videoing us in Morocco. He’d find out where we were and he’d follow us and set up wherever we were surfing. He was doing it the whole time we were there,” says Tommy. “He’s been pretty much blackmailing me for the past six months – I had to pay him $300 US not to post the film’s ender.” 

Watch Desert Dogs in full to see the clip Tom is talking about, and for more Moroccan yearning, click here.